


Costumes

by MonsterTesk



Series: Apparel [14]
Category: Teen Wolf (TV)
Genre: M/M, Multi
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-08-01
Updated: 2016-08-01
Packaged: 2018-07-28 18:46:06
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,059
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7652620
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/MonsterTesk/pseuds/MonsterTesk
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Things aren't always what they appear. Isaac knows this well.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Costumes

**Author's Note:**

> I wrote this a long time ago and postponed posting it in favor of another thing focused on Isaac that I never finished.

Isaac has understood the concept of forced perspective since his brother died. He could see it in the lines of his father's shoulders when he smiled at teachers. Those lines promised pain and terror and darkness. Fear. But all the teachers saw was openness, friendliness, pride.   
He understands that things are rarely how they appear. He knows this as well as he knows the tightness in his chest, the screams that will not come when the lid closes and the click of the padlock is muffled and out of sight.   
He's always aware of forced perspective.

Like how Erica secretly hates herself and believes she's not worth the same as her two lovers. Instead of showing others this self doubt, she projects confidence and sureness.   
Isaac can see how weak the lines of it are, how she thinks she's erected a staw-man in her own place. He knows she's wrong in the same breath that he knows that telling her this will snap the strings she uses to keep herself up.

He keeps it to himself.

But there's another kind of forced perspective. A kind that's inwardly targeted. It's this, and not the type that Erica uses, that is the most insidious.

And he can see it in Derek. In the way his back loosens, smile shines, and posture straightens whenever he comes in the room. It's never a big thing, no; it's not shouted words or tight hugs or anything like that. Forced perspective is subtle, invasive, ever-present.   
It's how he's almost... Unknowingly conscious of every touch, ever word, every interaction he has with him.   
He's forcing himself to believe and feel differently than he actually does and that's– that's dangerous.   
Isaac knows he'll get nothing but the flatline of a heart that believes it's being true when it's not if he confronts him.

So when Derek comes home from a day out with him, slides naked and hot and hard into bed, When he nuzzles the back of Isaac's head and murmurs flighty things into his ear, When he kisses Isaac and says he wants him, When he groans and shivers, drags nails down Isaac's back and bites at his lips, Isaac knows it's not for him.

He knows Derek is forcing himself to feel as if he doesn't love Stiles anymore. He knows that he's pretending he's not imagining Stiles above him, in him, loving him back the way Stiles never will again.

Even when Derek whispers Isaac's name like a plea, like a prayer to some higher power who will never listen, he's thinking of another man and that–   
That's the danger in forced perspective.

Because Isaac wants him, loves him, goes mad with it whenever Derek begs him to take him. And he will. Because he'd rather have this, have Derek, than lose him to a man who will never forgive Derek for what he did in the name of love.

But that's fine. Isaac can live with it.   
Even if sometimes he looks upon Stiles' scars and feels nothing but jealousy for the man who could drive his beloved to insanity with something so possessive, desperate, all-consuming.   
And if, on occasion, he pretends in his head that he and Stiles' positions were reversed... That Stiles' lover loves Isaac more deeply, more profoundly, than he could ever love another person and that that passion drove Chris to mania, to acts so astoundingly wrong that Isaac could never forgive him for his deeds, and now Isaac has fallen for someone else- someone who suits him perfectly and loves him genuinely and entirely without malice- then... Well, it hurts no one important. In fact, it changes nothing to think that Stiles is the runner up, the best only in convenience and means, to Chris.

Isaac knows it's not true. He knows it's a forced perspective that could never happen.

It just means that when Stiles and Chris sit him down. Stiles with his mouth pinched into an uncomfortable grimace and Chris already flushing at the ears, Isaac can't say no to them. He can't say no to watching, witnessing a love so profound it changed not just them but everyone around them.   
And later, when Chris' fingers dig so hard into Isaac's thigh that it hurts, pulses all the way to his dick, well, imagining becomes easy. Especially when he pulls the man into his lap, feels him squirm against Isaac's cock and project desperation so hard that Isaac feels pangs of sympathy. He'd felt so small, so fragile, in Isaac's lap that he wanted to enfold the man, fuck him like Chris so deserved- head thrown back, body against the wall, as Isaac holds him up and fucks into him so hard the support beams shake in time with Chris' moans.   
So when Chris comes, body shaking, fingers clawing at Isaac, he keeps his eyes locked on to Stiles, pretends that it had been his voice saying Chris was his, that Isaac's possessiveness had been the thing to have made this powerful man come undone.

If only for a moment.

Or if, later– much later, Isaac squeezes his own dick, closes his eyes, and thinks about how small Chris had seemed sitting in Isaac's lap, on how Isaac could have done whatever he wanted, how hot and wet and eager Chris had been to suck Isaac off, while listening to Stiles and Chris fuck from the spare bedroom of their home... No one needs to know about it and Isaac is very good at forced perspective.

It doesn't matter what he fantasizes about. Not really. And it hurts no one important to sometimes pretend that when he touches Chris- wraps a hand around his shoulder, pulls him back, manhandles him just a little- that Chris flashes for just a second with ripe heat, to pretend that sometimes he catches Chris looking at Isaac's hands with consideration. He knows that Chris' heart and body belong to someone else entirely; that Chris is a devoted boyfriend and, later, a devoted husband. Besides, Isaac has Derek. Derek who wakes him up with soft warm kisses. Derek who thinks that Isaac doesn't know he sometimes hides just to watch him stock books. Derek who whispers Isaac's name in bed. Derek who reaches for Isaac when he's feeling insecure, unsafe. And Chris has Stiles.

So Isaac keeps it to himself.


End file.
